Happy Birthday To Me!

The ToolBank is run by a staff of two: the love of my life, Executive Director, Noah Smock, and a wonderful friend and all around rock star, Program Manager, Rachel Thompson. Noah has planned the best birthday I’ve ever had this year, including two trips and a surprise concert…and I’ve been told, more to come tonight! Rachel helped make it all possible by babysitting our cats while we were out of town and keeping me from worrying by sending regular photos!

All year, I watch Noah work his ass off to make the ToolBank the best possible community resource it can possibly be. He consistently works beyond regular business hours in order to meet community members where they are. He works Monday-Friday, 9-5 conducting normal business operations and he works weekends and evenings because so many people are organizing their community work outside of their full-time jobs and can only access the ToolBank after their day jobs end. Noah inspires me because he leads in order to serve.

It would seem that working 50+ hours a week would impact our home life, but just as love has the capacity to multiply, miraculously, so does Noah’s time. I rarely feel slighted by his dedication to the ToolBank. He is an amazing person and an amazing partner. He plays with the cats, spends time with my family (my mother and great-niece pictured above), supports my ambitions and stands by my side. He puts up with all my selfies and is the voice of reason during all of my ill-conceived capers. I’ll end this paragraph now before I start quoting Whitney Houston lyrics…but he is all the man I need!

I have already had the most phenomenally happy birthday. If you would like to make it even better, please support my fundraiser for the ToolBank so that I can give back a fraction of what Noah and Rachel have given me.